!|RST PERSON
Courting Justice
'Man, proud man, drest in a little
authority; most ignorant of what he's
most assured'. Shakespeare is always
a sobering thought as I ride my bicycle
southwards on the mean streets from
Waterloo Station to Camberwell
Green
Magistrates'
Court.
Sometimes the magistrates' retiring
room at Camberwell is sunlit. Enjoy
it, the courts here are almost all
internal rooms without any natural
light. The clerks arrive and we huddle
together into benches of three to go
over the morning list. The ushers
arrive and bench by bench we go to
our courts.
High Drama
As the doors open ... 'All stand!' ...
and we take our seats, high under the
Royal Arms set upon a hanging of
blue velvet behind us, Counsel and
solicitors ranged beneath. The public
are crammed into a tiny glass fronted
enclosure. The police officer with
clipboard announces the first case.
He,
Chorus and Major Domo,
determines the pace of the action. Let
no- one delude himself, this, into
which we are now entered, is a
dramaturgical scene where the formal
social rules are spelled out —
property rights, limits of physical
force and boundaries of sexual licence
and much else besides. The essence of
the matter is despatch. There may be
15 or 20 cases requiring some decision
this morning and perhaps as many or
more this afternoon. Typically, this is
a day not for trials but for sentence.
Most defendants have pleaded guilty
already. Some are represented. The
majority of those whom we shall see
this morning will be poor,
unemployed
and
relatively
inarticulate. Their crimes will be
predominantly those of theft. Small,
mean, stupid thefts; thefts committed
under the stress of poverty or the
liberating effects of drink. Few of
them threaten society in that stock
markets do not quake at their
defalcations. Others will be in court
on account of their proclivity for
violence against property or against
the persons of those like themselves
who are young adult males from the
'lower orders' of society who knock
each other about when drunk. Those
who are not represented sometimes
have a Social Enquiry Report (SER)
to present them in a better light.
Thank God for the Probation Service.
The SERs so often speak, Portia like,
for the inarticulate. Generally they
make it plain that they are sorry.
Sorry that it ever happened. That they
got caught. For having actually done
wrong. Who knows. Certainly we on
the bench don't and must rely on such
unreliable things as demeanour or
their use of words.
Sentencing, rather than weighing
of guilt or innocence, is what the job is
about most of the time. Ideally, the
bench withdraws to the retiring room
to discuss sentence. Three heads are
very much better than one,
particularly if the one in the middle is
a bit on the big side. I recall my
apprentice days 20 years ago, when
some chairmen behaved as if they
were stipendiaries and turned to their
flanking
book-ends
with
an
interrogative '£25, all right?'. Today
common sense and compromise have
a re-assuring habit of holding their
own and individuals can express their
views. Sometimes, if the sentence is
going to be a tough and complex one,
it has to be written down to make sure
it is spoken without error. Just what is
its object? To punish? To deter
others? To put a kind of price tag on
this kind of behaviour? How much
must poverty reduce the fine? How
far must the needs of a dependant
family determine whether this is a
case for custody or not? All urgent
questions, and all the time, the press
of other cases waiting to be dealt with.
Loaded Justice
Around noon, ideas about justice,
objectivity and high-mindedness are
put to the test. Enter the pariahs: the
drunk drivers. Almost without
exception they are anxious only about
the length of their impending
disqualification or the size of the fine.
Some, with fearful records of
previous convictions, anxiously
wonder if they are bound for some
brief stay at Her Majesty's pleasure.
Joe Public seems to distinguish
between those whose weapon is a
beer glass and those whose weapon is
a motor car. Serious motoring
offences are in a strange no man's land
CJM
CRIMINAL Jl'STICE MATTERS
and few magistrates have a good map
of the place. After them, the odd
'means enquiry5: the character who
has still not, after many months, paid
anything off the fine imposed for a
string of motoring offences. The court
clerk: 'You were fined £75 and £25
costs. Why have you paid nothing
after 15 months?'. 'Well, I 'aven't 'ad
the money, 'ave I?' is the demotic
negative interrogative. What he
means is that the money he has had
has been, and continues to be, spent
at his pleasure and he has not the least
intention of paying it to the Secretary
of State. He lives on the rialto of the
half world between crime and sharp
business. We consider whether to
have him searched. A minute or two
later and the court officer reveals that
he has £50 about his person. He
stoutly maintains that the money is his
mother's and that he was taking it to
pay one of her creditors whose name
he does not know and at an address he
cannot recall. We order the cash to be
taken from him and make a committal
order for 14 days suspended while he
pays off the balance at £5 a week. He
goes away, knowing he should have
trusted his mate in the public gallery
to 'mind' the cash for him.
We go to lunch.
And so to the afternoon. Clerks
change like post horses, but
magistrates soldier on. Local
authority prosecutions, parking
meter prosecutions by the gross — a
mountain of forensic detritus from
bureaucratic systems that lean upon
the courts for their ultimate
sanctions. No defendants now. Only
the presenting staff. Business goes
along with a dull incantation. Not all
days are like this. Sometimes there is
a contested motoring case or even a
'how did the glass splinter get into the
tin of meat, then?'. But not today. It is
nearly five o'clock and the fluorescent
light gives no hint of the passage of
time. 'That concludes your afternoon
list, Sir'.
Stumps are drawn and it's back
on the bike to Waterloo. No, I didn't
enjoy my 'day in court'. I hope I never
do.
Terence Morris JP is Professor of
Social Institutions at the London
School of Economics